Based on economic and environmental factors related to energy efficiency, the automotive industry is being increasingly encouraged to design lighter structures, making use of adhesive bonding in vehicle body frames. To meet the standards of the automotive sector, adhesive joints must provide high strength and stiffness, low cost and good energy absorption at a component level, thereby ensuring good impact strength and passenger safety. This work aims to study, at room temperature (24°C), the impact response of a real scale automotive structure bonded with a crash-resistant epoxy, allowing to access the suitability of adhesives for automotive structural purposes. The epoxy adhesive was found to successfully transfer the loads to the aluminium substrates and not to compromise the integrity of the structure, as its failure was dominated by the behaviour of aluminium. Results obtained with a numerical model of the component were found to be in close agreement with the experimental failure load, demonstrating that numerical analysis can be a viable tool to predict the structure’s behaviour. In addition, a polyurethane was used as an alternative to the epoxy system to bond the structure, proving that the joint behaves better in the presence of a more flexible adhesive, as no failure was found for this case. Aluminium single-lap joints with two adhesive thicknesses were tested as a complement to understand the influence of this parameter on the impact response of a joint, showing a 21% decrease in strength when the highest thickness was used.

中文翻译：

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粘接汽车结构动态响应的实验和数值研究

基于与能源效率相关的经济和环境因素，越来越多地鼓励汽车行业设计更轻的结构，在车身框架中使用粘合剂。为了满足汽车行业的标准，粘合接头必须在组件级别提供高强度和刚度、低成本和良好的能量吸收，从而确保良好的冲击强度和乘客安全。这项工作旨在研究在室温 (24°C) 下，使用抗碰撞环氧树脂粘合的真实规模汽车结构的冲击响应，从而了解粘合剂对汽车结构用途的适用性。发现环氧粘合剂成功地将负载转移到铝基板上，并且不会损害结构的完整性，因为它的失败是由铝的行为决定的。发现使用组件的数值模型获得的结果与实验破坏载荷非常一致，表明数值分析可以成为预测结构行为的可行工具。此外，聚氨酯被用作环氧树脂体系的替代品来粘合结构，证明在存在更柔韧的粘合剂的情况下接头表现更好，因为在这种情况下没有发现故障。测试了具有两种粘合剂厚度的铝单搭接接头作为补充，以了解该参数对接头冲击响应的影响，显示使用最高厚度时强度降低 21%。发现使用组件的数值模型获得的结果与实验破坏载荷非常一致，表明数值分析可以成为预测结构行为的可行工具。此外，聚氨酯被用作环氧树脂体系的替代品来粘合结构，证明在存在更柔韧的粘合剂的情况下接头表现更好，因为在这种情况下没有发现故障。测试了具有两种粘合剂厚度的铝单搭接接头作为补充，以了解该参数对接头冲击响应的影响，显示使用最高厚度时强度降低 21%。发现使用组件的数值模型获得的结果与实验破坏载荷非常一致，表明数值分析可以成为预测结构行为的可行工具。此外，聚氨酯被用作环氧树脂体系的替代品来粘合结构，证明在存在更柔韧的粘合剂的情况下接头表现更好，因为在这种情况下没有发现故障。测试了具有两种粘合剂厚度的铝单搭接接头作为补充，以了解该参数对接头冲击响应的影响，显示使用最高厚度时强度降低 21%。聚氨酯被用作环氧树脂系统的替代品来粘合结构，证明在存在更柔韧的粘合剂的情况下接头表现更好，因为在这种情况下没有发现故障。测试了具有两种粘合剂厚度的铝单搭接接头作为补充，以了解该参数对接头冲击响应的影响，显示使用最高厚度时强度降低 21%。聚氨酯被用作环氧树脂系统的替代品来粘合结构，证明在存在更柔韧的粘合剂的情况下接头表现更好，因为在这种情况下没有发现故障。测试了具有两种粘合剂厚度的铝单搭接接头作为补充，以了解该参数对接头冲击响应的影响，显示使用最高厚度时强度降低 21%。